Feldon On June 21, 2012, Dave “Smokejumper” Georgeson (Executive Director of Development) discussed the upcoming Game Update 64, specifically PvP, Battlegrounds, and Fighter changes with Akil “Lyndro” Hooper (Lead Designer), Mike “Xelgad” Ganz (Associate Game Designer), and Brian “Omougi” Ferguson (Associate Game Designer).
Game Update 64 will be hitting the Test and Test Copy servers next Tuesday.
NOTE: Make sure you’ve got your volume turned down as the video opens with a loud throat clearing.
Class Focii
Dating back to the Rise of Kunark expansion (initially only on top-end raid gear) Class Focii are effects present on the seven main armor pieces (gloves, boots, chest, etc.) appropriate for your class.
Over the years, these effects have trickled down from the top Raid gear to easier x4 raid gear, then x2 (12-person) raid zones. With Destiny of Velious, some of these effects appeared on Ry’Gorr group gear. Finally, with GU63: Skyshrine, these effects made it into solo quest gear.
With Game Update 64, the Racial Traits/Character Attributes tab is undergoing a radical change. Instead of a shopping list of Health and Power Regeneration, Attribute Pools (Strength, Stamina, Intelligence, etc.), and Resists, you will be able to start picking Class Focii at level 9, and those health/power regeneration, attributes, and resists will all be rolled into those Class Focii.
More Choices: We’re getting more choices of Class Focii. Instead of each class having just one effect per piece of armor, you’ll be able to choose In-combat Run Speed for example.
It had reached a point where players just expected to have their Class Focii on all their armor, so moving this to the Character Attributes tab will allow players to always have them. At level 90, you will have access to all the Class Focii choices, and they will remain in effect regardless of what gear you choose to wear. And you will be able to Respec your Class Focii choices just as you can now with your Racial Traits and AA tabs.
Shard Refunds: Some Class Focii have had to be purchased over the years with Marks of Manaar, Void Shards, or Pure Primal Velium Shards. When players login after GU64, these adornments will vanish, and players will be refunded the appropriate number of shards.
Passive Window
With Game Update 64, a new window has been added where you can view any and all active effects and benefits you are receiving from Achievements, Class Focii, etc.
Fighters
Recklessness — A new fighter stance available to all fighters at level 20. Extreme offense-based High DPS ‘attack’ stance. Your agro generation and ability to take a hit are greatly reduced. Most raids only have slots for a Main Tank and Off-Tank, so this change is intended to allow additional fighters in a raid and not feel the slot is “wasted”.
Strikethrough Immunity changes — When fighters cast a Strikethrough immunity, their avoidance will actually go up and they’ll actually be able to avoid the Strikethrough.
Fighter Heals Going Percentage-based — Instead of fixed hitpoint amounts, fighter heals are becoming percentage-based. This will allow these heals to keep pace with increases in health due to gear inflation.
PvP / Battlegrounds
Details of the PvP and Battlegrounds changes in Game Update 64 can be found in the GU64: PvP and Battlegrounds Announcement.
- Shared PvP/PvE stats. Ever since PvP stats were separate from PvE stats, players have been asking for this change to be undone.
- Over 1,000 new PvP items are being created, and both Battlegrounds and open PvP (Nagafen) can buy this armor with the same tokens.
- The Frozen Tundra battleground is being removed — it wasn’t fun and player feedback has been overwhelmingly negative. We will bring it back after a substantial rework.
- Changes to the existing 3 Battlegrounds to make them less gimmicky and more fun.
- Bonus tokens for Kill Streaks, ending another player’s Kill Streak, etc.
- Tokens — Instead of 5 tokens for winning and 2 tokens for losing, tokens are now dynamically calculated based on the duration of the match. This should encourage players to pick any Battleground, instead of just the shortest battles.
- Level Agnostic Battlegrounds. Level 30-89 players will now all play in the same Battlegrounds and have access to a shared Lobby. Real-time calculations adjust your incoming and outgoing damage to give all players a fighting chance.
- Battlegrounds Leaderboards window — Changes to this window with more information. Also, new voiceover has been added to announce the progress of battles.
These changes, as well as the Qeynos Revamp, a slight revamp of the art and quest rewards of Darklight Woods, Quest NPC Targeting, and being able to use Quest items from within the Quest window all come to the Test server next Tuesday, June 26th, 2012.
Q&A? There was no Q&A segment in this week’s SOE Community Webcast.
Nice overall changes, and finally they attempt to fix pvp so more can enjoy it.
SO what’s the point in being a Mage or Rogue if I can now be a dps tank? Having all that armor, being able to aoe, and now having a dps stance to cause even more dmg just seems unfair.
The way I heard it, it’s when the fighter casts an avoidance buff (SK’s Furor, Paladin’s Stonewall, etc), a Strikethrough Immunity will be tagged on to that buff, whereas right now those buffs are susceptible to strikethrough.
Provided that the percentage-based heals are given a decent percentage, all in all good changes for the fighters. I’m anxious to see the class balances and tweaks that are coming as well.
Topic: Strikethrough immunity. it was strange what they said.
Did they maybe added a strikethrough immunity to all Fighter “Ooops” abilitys ? So that you dont die an death by random while you used one of them ?
Fighter change : more DPS ? WTF ?
I wonder how much dps a 600MA Extreme Offense stance monk will deal on single target now ?
Can they fix conjurors so we can use all our spells instead of giving more dps to everyone ?
Recklessness — Does this mean tank classes can now be accepted as a DPS role?
I hope they tweak/scale percentages of the “recklessness” stance to bring the low dps fighters closer to high dps fighters if not this change will be of no worth. Great opportunity though to bring some of the fighter classes back to the playing field rather than Crusader/Brawler Fest 2012.
I am very interested in this GU actually. I am hoping it won’t be a Charlie Foxtrot. Look to history however, it could go either way.
Wonder if removing the Focus Effect from armour will continue to make gear trivial, and overpower people vs the heroic content.
@panther even with this the vast majority of heroic content peeps still struggle with UD. This pleases me 😉
I say design most heroic content to be accessible by all and throw in a little where most get their ass kicked. I am cool with that.
I’m concerned that the focus effect choices will be limited as to how many we can take since currently we could take every one we want and put second ones on armor pieces that were not available on the armor…if they limit the amount we can take dont think its going to be that great.
As for the new fighter stance…most people who played tanks and everyone in general assumed the changes would be specificly toward their hate generation and uncap hate…guess not.
P.S. I still play a templar as my main be nice if we get some changes or a head up on changes on the class…but I think every class is looking for some help…guess I’ll have to read the complete update notes on that….hopefully they do the same on the forums like they did with the prestige abilites when they were on test for dedicated community feedback.
@Daalilama: You’ll be able to pick up a class focus every 9 levels, if I heard right. That means you should be able to get all the ones you’re currently able to and maybe even an extra. Depends on how many options they give us.
Recklessness – Bad Idea, just drop it.
Strike-thru Immunities – Not remotely enough information here. Might as well just add it to all defensive stances rather than short terms. Though they might be making these immunities extremely short term depending on the abilities that get them.
Missing – No changes to hate-mod cap.
Ty SOE for not fixing hate system. Clearly, this game won’t last until EQ Next.
I hope they will add a turtle stance for us DPS classes. So we can tank if needed to. Recklessness, I agree with Atan on this.
I tanked UD successfully 8 times through with my SK in access-quest gear mixed with withered lands crap and 10% hate-mod initially (now in SS gear).
So if people are “struggling in UD” it has to do more with a lack of skill/knowledge/teamplay than anything else.
I tanked UD successfully 8 times through with my SK in access-quest gear mixed with withered lands crap and 10% hate-mod initially (now in SS gear).
That’s nice. What was your healer (or healers) sporting? Your DPS? Support?
If there’s anything I’ve learned, it’s that tanking doesn’t happen in a vacuum…
Yes a good healer and even more so a good enchanter can make UD seem like a cake walk. Not saying a good tank don’t help, just that a crappy tank can be made to look good with good utility classes.
@Alan : all around, COOL STORY BRO =D
recklessnes = excellent idea! guessing you don’t raid much tho so trololo bro
strikethrough = needed tweaking but wutever tl;dr bro =D
hate-mod solution:
1. Open Auction House
2. Search ‘Ethereal Aggressiveness’
3. ????
4. Profit
Congratulations! You now can hold aggro from T1 deeps.
Brotip: If you don’t feel like pressing buttons, simply visit reforger and skyrocket hate-gain to >100%
Shard refund for focii? Guess they learned from the critmit adorn debacle…
I hope they dont just give every one an average of the +HP/Power and and a bones to there main stat and not STA/ Max Health.
Looks like Clownshoe didn’t take their ADHD meds today.
is their a text version/main points available anywhere?
@Zivo
Feld posted all the main points of the pod. Well he left out SJ creepy laugh/excitement over the revamped of DLW.
oh wow i dont know how i missed that right at the top 😛 ty hehe
Uberfuzzy, they didn’t learned nothing. That was just an arbitrary decision.
@Silzin
Based on the screenshot Xelgad posted and what the proper choices at the moment are:
– We’ll keep the same health (10 x 1% instead of 4 x 2.5%)
– We’ll keep the same power (still no increase at all, wizards may be annoyed)
– We’ll gain 20 health regen …
– We’ll gain 20 power regen
– We’ll gain either 20 primary stat or 20 stamina, whichever you aren’t taking now
– We’ll gain 1660 noxious, arcane and elemental resists
– We’ll loose 300 mitigation
– We can take usefull general things instead of useless foci
So overall, I’d day this is a tiny buff.
Assuming they resist unlocking or even bumping hate-mod, is there an over-cap bonus given for hate-mod? I have not heard of one..
If definately not, perhaps there should be (and not just for positive overcap that fighters experience, but also negative for everyone else). I have a few initial thoughts as what I would ideally like to see for those bonuses, the situations where they would most likely occur, etc.. but I’ll reserve suggesting that to those smarter than me.
Wow that sounds like a huge rewrite, pulling off all those adorments giving you back shards, and the one guy mispoke and said all the way to level 95??
We know an expansion is coming and so is a level cap. We also know they are not in a race to hit 100 so 95 is the most likely level cap with the expansion.
soooo…sounds like in raids the off tank MONK will be on top of the parse. lol. thats a little OP me thinks
Wonder when they are going to give T1 DPS a 3rd stance, so they can tank when a 3rd or 4th tank is needed instead of being sit out?
SJ: Making players think about what classes are need in a raid is not fun.
Dev1: Yea we need to make it fun so we can get more likes on Facebook.
Dev2: Screw it, lets make 4 stances give them to all players. Stance will now be Tanks, DPS, Heal and Utillie.
SJ: Now that is FUN! *giggle like a little school girl* I bet we’ll get tons of Facebook likes over this!
I hope this isnt the same kind of change to stance and aggro they tryed to sold us a few years ago. It was on test and no one liked it. We will see.
Oh oh Does tis mean I can now get the class focus to remove the rez effects from my pally rez?
I can hear it it now..get that pally with his better heals, reckless stance, and clean rez in raid right now… (hears to hoping)
@clownshoe lmfao @you thinking Atan doesn’t raid much. He’s forgotten more about game mechanics than you will know bro!
@whystherumgone
Great story bro! Hey check out Atan’s (dps) adornments sometime and then ask me why he has trouble with aggro =D
Brotip: Red and yellow adorns offer great bonuses to aggro. Visit your local thurgadin dock representative today!
@Clownshoe
And what adorns would they be? Plz tell us!
Who here can see the storm coming on non-refunded shards on gear that players muted last week becasue they got quest rewards better than their red slot adornment gear and are now the proud owner of a shiny new infusion while their friends that horde all their gear sit back and profit.
http://u.eq2wire.com/soe/character_detail/450971862056
to the uninformed – 28% hate gain won’t hold aggro from ry’gorr deeps. Also, you’re welcome for showing you the uber u.eq2wire.com website =D
1. Open web-browser of your choice
2. Type u.eq2. com and search for “Atan”
3. ????
4. Profit
Now you can see not only this characters gear/adorns/stats but others as well!
Brotip: crit bonus adorns help your deeps but help aggro by miniscule amounts. To fix this, visit your local gnoll thurgadin dock adorn merchant today! =D
Brotip: DPS > threat anyday, it has been this way forever. Plus if he is at 100% hate it would be real of dumb to adorn hate. Just FYI for you.
He is MT. Why would he add hate mods when his coercer, dirge, swashy caps him….thus his comment about increasing hate mod cap. And yeah as Lan said DPS>threat. So brotip: if your capped on hate best to visit your local gnoll on thurg docks and add dps increasing adorns…
Not addressing the hate mod cap is the biggest ‘miss’ from this revamp.
By opening up the cap you give people the option of specing different ways, by leaving the cap, you really only have one good way to adorn / spec.
^^^^ this. Fix it SoE!
I fail to see an real benefit Atan. Save for the few -hate adorns deeps could swap out for….a few more(like 4-6) what? CB? Pot? CC? and tanks that have ideal raid/group setup allowed to swap +hate gain for the same? Sorry not enough to advertise diversity IMO; in fact, I think it’s quite the opposite.
By having a cap on hate gain (again I have a hard time believing hate to be an issue SINCE the raise in GU59), you have ‘options’ in what you are able to max, deeps vs. +,- hate (or guess you could be the unique super cool jackass with that extra 1% converted overstat and use 10+ adorns doin it). Albeit, preGU63 those few 2-4 adorns were more meaningful than now, what with the gear/reforging allowing everyone to hit their useful soft caps you can play with casting speed for tanks or flurry for coercer/warden; exciting times! But at the core, w/o hate having a reasonable cap, we’d all telederp to thurg, form a huge circle jerk and while reaching for the lotion think ‘hmmm, CB or pot?’.
tl;dr – Betchers gonna betch, regardless of how close that carrot gets to the mouth =D
I wasn’t suggesting removing the negative cap.